Driven by Passion, page 3
“Socrates is loyal. He didn’t sack you after you had no points in a season. He gave you a better opportunity.” Victor automatically boosted Lucien, pulling him away from any negativity.
Lucien thumped Victor on the shoulder. “Can you listen to yourself? What makes you so special that you think Socrates would sack you, when he literally doesn’t sack anyone?”
“He sacked Reginald.”
“Only under severe duress, after how many seasons of terrible cars and finishing near the back of the pack. You’ve said it yourself. Socrates is loyal. He trusts that you’ll solve this engine problem.”
“I suppose he does.”
“He does. Now you need to trust yourself.”
Victor had heard that phrase his whole life. The joy of having mother who worked as a therapist; and unlike the stereotype that a therapist was so busy fixing everyone else that she couldn’t run her own family, Victor’s Ma was the best mother. She encouraged him to follow his dream. He probably should call her. It’d been a couple of weeks.
“This is my favourite part of the test track.” Lucien stood on the outside of turn eleven, his hands on his hips as he stared down the long curving straight.
“It’s the fastest part.”
“Yes.” Lucien turned towards Victor, whose stomach sank as the joy on Lucien’s face disappeared. “Victor, what is the matter? Why are you frowning?”
Chapter 3
Lucien hadn’t expected to have to cajole Victor to get him to talk about his engine problems. The engine failures had consumed Victor since they’d happened. It ought to be easy to get him to talk about it; and now Victor was frowning? Obviously Lucien had missed something crucial, and he didn’t think it was as simple as Victor worrying that he’d be sacked if he didn’t figure out why their cars kept catching fire. If that was it, wouldn’t Victor talk more?
“I’m fine.”
“Stop lying.” Lucien was bored with this game. “What are you not telling me? You are evading this discussion. Why?”
Victor shoved his hands into his pockets, his shoulders slumped. “Trust myself? That’s what you said.”
“Yes.” Lucien was struck by the urge to hug Victor, to comfort him. He shook his head to clear away something so silly. Lucien knew nothing about comforting people; it was a harsh world and only the tough survived, or so his father had always said. After a couple of long breaths, Lucien was able to boost Victor, not tear himself down for not being friendly enough. “I know this puzzle is frustrating, but you are the literal expert. You designed these cars. You took the engine from the manufacturer, fit it to your design, and made it better. Faster. You should trust yourself.”
“But what if I can’t solve this?” Victor’s voice had lost all tone and he bowed his head, as if it were too hard to keep holding it up.
“What are you talking about? You can solve this. It’s just a few engine fires.”
“Just.”
“Yeah.” Lucien wanted to shake his friend. How could he be so harsh on himself? “What is really going on?”
“Fuck. You sound like my mother.” Victor sighed. “I’m sorry. That’s a good thing. She’s great. It’s just—”
“Just what?” Lucien was missing something crucial here.
“What if I fail?” Victor pressed his hands to his face, covering his eyes. “I never fail. This one has me stumped and I don’t think I’ll cope if I actually fail.”
Lucien blinked. “Are you fucking kidding me? Are you avoiding talking to me about these engines because you are self-sabotaging?”
Victor’s nostrils widened and he gasped. “Fuck.”
“You are?”
“Yes. Maybe. No. What if this makes no sense because it’s not a failure? What if it’s not something I did wrong? What if it is ... sabotage?” Victor’s dark brown eyes flashed, and Lucien could see his brain working. The lacklustre stance disappeared, and Victor began to pace down the DRS zoned curved straight. With a slight banking towards the outside of the track, this was the quickest part of the test circuit and Victor was certainly walking quicker than he’d moved today. Not that the two things were related, it was just a little ironic to see Victor move faster into the speed trap.
“How?” Lucien jogged after Victor, who was walking with renewed energy, his arms swinging at his sides as he rushed towards the engineering workshop. Could it be so simple as someone trying to upset Gamble Racing? They had done much better this season than in the last few seasons, making it into the midfield and therefore earning more prizemoney as constructors than in previous years.
“Brazil. Ondrej finished P3. Paulo’s car had engine failure. It was our fourth problem in three races. Then we travelled to Abu Dhabi and both cars caught fire. What a way to end the season.”
“I was there. What a fucking day.”
“Yeah.” Victor stood on the outside of the curve, far from the racing line, with his hands on his head. The dark winter shadows of the woods behind him reflected the grim atmospheric expression on Victor’s face. “Is this too convenient? Sabotage? What am I thinking?”
Lucien tried to keep his expression blank, but yeah, those were good questions to be asking. The security around S1 teams and their cars was pretty tight. “Keep walking. Let it percolate for a while.” He didn’t know much about life or how to be a decent person, but he knew that walking helped him sort out the mess in his head. If it worked for him, hopefully it would also work for Victor. They walked in silence all the way down the long straight towards turn twelve and the technical part of the track.
“I’m going to cut through the old part of the track and head back into the workshop.” Victor didn’t wait for Lucien’s answer, not that it mattered because taking Victor out of the shed and making him walk had helped. This annoying niggle in his own chest as Victor marched away shouldn’t matter. He was hardly being abandoned by Victor because this wasn’t about him. Lucien just wanted to help a friend solve a puzzle that had been evading him. A handsome friend whose legs and ass looked great as he power-walked back to the engineering shop.
Lucien rubbed his temples. It’d obviously been too long since he’d had sex if he was noticing how amazing Victor looked. Shit. He didn’t even know if Victor was queer. Normally, Lucien would’ve guessed in favour because Socrates collected queer people, recruiting them into his racing teams. Whether this was purposeful, or merely because Socrates could see past people’s backgrounds to value their achievements, it was hard to tell. It didn’t really matter. Being at Gamble Racing felt like the home Lucien had never had. It was a place where everyone accepted him exactly as he was, anger management issues and everything else, and put their efforts into helping him grow and become a better person. It was truly magical; especially for a boy like himself who’d never had a loving family. He’d had a father who’d grudgingly accepted that his son was gay because nothing except winning races mattered, and that meant his acceptance was conditional on his success.
Lucien glanced at his watch. He still had another forty minutes before he was due at the big house to meet with his team.
He didn’t have many solutions to his lack of family, and it didn’t matter. He was still young—twenty-five—he didn’t need to settle down and think about having his own family yet. Ha. Lucien kicked the tyre barrier at the edge of the track. What the fuck did he know about how to be part of a family? All he knew was car racing, and he was damned good at it. He walked back up the track, the wrong way, until he reached the section heading into turn twelve. From here, he stood quietly, assessing the track to find the best driving line even though he’d driven this track hundreds of times. Turns twelve and thirteen were designed to replicate Variante Villeneuve at Imola; hold the outside line through twelve to maintain speed, then turn in late for thirteen, leaving half a car width of space to the exit barrier. From there, come in wide to fourteen, taking the apex late and touching the exit kerb towards turn fifteen. Late brake and turn sharply to follow the outside barrier until the turning point for the second apex of the double apexed turn sixteen to take the kerb heavily on the exit. Carry the exit speed into the chicane of seventeen and eighteen, braking to avoid the sausage kerb on the apex of seventeen and cover the apex of eighteen to make as much room as possible for a good exit, and a quick slingshot onto the home straight. Push hard down the straight, heading wide on the right side of the track to set up for turn one and the next lap.
Lucien automatically held his hands up, on a fake wheel, practicing each turn as he ran through it. This technical part of the test track was well designed, allowing for drivers to really test the cornering and downforce of a car under pressure, as well as how quickly the car responded coming out of a slow tricky segment into the flat-out speed of the long home straight. Lucien vaulted the tyre barriers that formed the edge of turn fourteen and headed directly across the old part of the track, avoiding walking the technical section. He wanted to check in with Victor once more before his own meeting.
The noise of several excited people greeted Lucien as he walked in from the pit garage practice area. Victor had gathered all of the engineering and mechanic staff that were currently in the building, and they all stood around the deconstructed cars, talking in loud voices.
“Stop.” Victor raised his hand. He’d taken off the large team jacket and stood there in his shirt with his sleeves rolled up, exposing his forearms. “One at a time with your theories.” Had Victor always had such lovely forearms and hands? Lucien felt a tug, pulling him towards Victor. Nothing real or tangible, just a weird feeling that he wanted to be beside him as he weathered this storm of over-enthusiastic puzzle solving. Was that the second or third time today that he’d had a weird, almost chemical attraction around Victor? It couldn’t be lust. Lucien had enough experience to know physical chemistry when he encountered it, and this wasn’t that. It was something more elemental, like attraction but different. Lust but not. It was on the tip of his tongue, except it wasn’t, because this wasn’t what lust usually felt like to him, it wasn’t the flashy chemistry that promised immediate pleasure. He dismissed it all as situational, nothing to stress about. As far as physical inputs went, this wasn’t one he needed to worry about. It didn’t impact on him as a driver, so it was likely irrelevant, just a niggle caused by seeing Victor in his element, commanding a group of enthusiastic engineers.
“Do you have an idea, Lucien?”
“Me?” Lucien had tuned out the noise and now everyone stared at him. “With regards to the engine fires?” He needed to buy himself some time, since he’d spent the last God-knows how long, thinking about families and the driving line on the test track and other things that weren’t going to help Victor resolve this puzzle. At all. The burgeoning obsession with how sexy Victor was really wasn’t going to be any use right now.
“Yes.”
“You guys are the experts. I’m just a driver.”
“Okay. Driver’s perspective. Ondrej and Paulo aren’t here. You are.”
Lucien chuckled. “Therefore, I’ll do? Even though I’m only an E driver.” He winked at Victor whose cheeks pinked.
“You have S1 experience. Your opinion is useful.”
Lucien didn’t need the reminder that he wasn’t the top dog anymore. He didn’t even want to be in S1, and yet he couldn’t get rid of that irritating voice that said S1 was the pinnacle of motorsport. The only achievement worthwhile aiming for.
He breathed in. “Fine. Play me the radio recordings for each engine failure, and I’ll give you the driver’s perspective.”
Skye, one of the tech people, tapped on their laptop. “Give me a second. I’ll pull them up. They aren’t the best quality, though.”
Lucien leaned in closer to Skye. “You didn’t get the remastered versions from that TV show?”
Skye glanced at him. “No. This season doesn’t air until March. This one is Ondrej at Austin.” Skye pushed a button and the recording played.
“We have smoke. Box for retirement, Ondrej.”
“What the fuck?”
“Box, box. I’m sorry.” Jaxxon’s concern was apparent to all, even through the crackle of the recording.
“That’s all there is,” Skye said.
“We couldn’t find anything in the pit, then the smoke faded, and Ondrej wanted to keep going, so we sent him out again,” Victor said.
Lucien nodded. “Play the next one.”
“Okay. This is Paulo at Brazil.”
“We have smoke, Paulo.” Paulo’s race engineer, Monica, said.
“How? There’s no loss of power.”
“Please pull the car over and power down.”
“Ahhhh. Fuck.” The recording didn’t have anything for a while until Monica spoke again.
“We have fire now, Paulo. Pull over quickly and power down.”
“Fucking fuck.”
“I don’t think we need to listen to Paulo’s frustration. Let’s listen to Paulo in Abu Dhabi,” Victor said. Skye pressed some buttons and Monica’s voice came through the laptop speakers.
“I’m sorry, Paulo. We have fire. Please pull over and get out of the car.”
“Fuck. Again?”
“Yes. If you can get near a marshal, that’d be good. Get out quickly.”
“Okay. But what the fuck?”
“Agreed. Paulo. Stop the car.”
Lucien had one question. “Can I hear Ondrej’s radio calls too?”
Skye nodded. “Here you are.”
“Fuck.” Ondrej swore first this time. What had he felt?
“Fire. Pull over and turn off the engine.” Jaxxon sounded frustrated.
“What the fuck, man?”
“Fire. Stop the car.”
“Fuck. What a shit way to end the season.”
Lucien pinched his nose. Until the last recording, Lucien had wondered how the drivers had no notice of anything going wrong, no loss of power, nothing. In the last one, Ondrej had maybe noticed something, but with all the other problems before, perhaps he’d been paying more attention, waiting for it.
“Well?” Victor asked.
“One thing stands out. In every single case, except the last one, none of the drivers had any loss of power before the fire. They didn’t notice the fire. How is that possible? It makes no sense that in all those situations, the driver knew nothing, felt nothing, saw nothing on the wheel.” His perspective didn’t add anything. No wonder Victor wanted to pull his hair out, because this made no sense.
“We had no warning on our data either.”
“How? How did no one have any notice? How do you have an engine fire with no loss of power?” Lucien understood the racing data well enough; speed into corners and that sort of thing, but the technical mechanics data was a bit beyond his mathematical abilities.
“That’s a very good question. We had nothing on our data either. It’s very odd.”
“Don’t you have sensors everywhere?”
Victor ran his hands through his hair. It shouldn’t look as interesting as it did. “Not everywhere. Skye, Georgie, Isambard; where don’t we have sensors on the car?” Victor asked.
“Skye, can you pull up a schematic?” Isambard asked. Everyone huddled around Skye’s laptop, squeezing in close to each other to get a good view. Lucien drifted to the back of the group. This next part of the discussion was beyond his capabilities.
“Hey Victor. I have a meeting with Socrates. Fill me in on what you find later, yeah?” Lucien had said his part, now the mechanics and engineers could take over and use their actual expertise to find the problem. He rested his hand between Victor’s shoulder blades to say goodbye and warmth flowed up his arm in the most disconcerting way. Odd. Victor glanced over his shoulder.
“Yeah. Thanks for this. We needed your perceptive.” The way Victor held Lucien’s gaze was ... nice. He yanked his arm away and nodded quickly before fleeing the building and this new confusion.
Chapter 4
Victor rubbed his eyes. Since Lucien’s comment about sensors, he’d spent four days in the workshop with his team, barely sleeping, as they ran tests on every part of the car that didn’t have a sensor. The most obvious theory was that the fire had started in the exhaust, but he didn’t want to miss anything. And the little niggle that it was sabotage wouldn’t go away either. Surely not. Sabotage was just a convenient excuse because he couldn’t find the actual problem.
“Please tell me you brought coffee?” Victor blinked at the hazy view of Lucien.
“I think you need sleep more than you need coffee.”
“I have to figure this out.”
“You do realise that it doesn’t have to be done today. Sleep, Victor.”
“I can’t.”
Lucien rested his hands on Victor’s shoulders, and Victor could just about let himself fall against his chest and snooze. He blinked rapidly instead. The idea of sleep sounded so good, he could succumb to it and never mind the engine issues. No. Snap out of it. He had to solve this. He couldn’t fail.
“Are you wearing the same clothes?” Lucien asked.
“Um...”
“You are. Have you even been home in the last couple of days?”
“No.” Victor had been sleeping on the couch in his office and ignoring his staff who kept telling him to go home. He couldn’t. There wasn’t much time until the new season. He’d spent most of the year designing next year’s car, so it was still on schedule, yet he would never be happy with it until he’d resolved this problem. What if the same issue also plagued the new car?
“Come with me.” Lucien picked Victor up and slung him over his shoulder. He fucking just picked him up. All the breath squeezed out of his lungs.
“Put me down.” This was ridiculous, even by Lucien’s standards.
“No.”
“How are you doing this? I’m heavier than you.” Victor was around the same height as Lucien. Lucien was lean, fit, an athlete, while Victor was broader across the shoulders. He used to be plumper too, but he hadn’t really been eating since Abu Dhabi and the disastrous race there. The floor looked weird from this angle.
